


all hazards and dangers we barter on chance

by Gwerfel



Series: Tozer & Armitage [3]
Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Blow Jobs, First Time, Fluff, Friendship, M/M, Period Typical Attitudes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-15 02:48:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,413
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29429085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gwerfel/pseuds/Gwerfel
Summary: As the summer approaches and the officers assure them that a thaw is on its way, they’re short of time and short of space; short of anything that would lend itself to proper roll-about, so for now it’s nothing more than what they can get away with.Sol thinks about it though, the better he gets to know Tommy Armitage.
Relationships: Thomas Armitage/Solomon Tozer
Series: Tozer & Armitage [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1898272
Comments: 9
Kudos: 27
Collections: The Terror Bingo, The Terror Rarepair Week 2021





	all hazards and dangers we barter on chance

**Author's Note:**

> Being cheeky and throwing this in for both rare pair week (Valentine's Day - Free Space) and my Terror Bingo 2020 fill 'lantern'.
> 
> Thank you to kt_fairy for reading and helping me edit!

“Then there was Pol who worked The Bells in Bristol; she was a fine one, longest legs you’ve ever seen, round arse, beautiful golden hair....”

“Yeah, and I bet it was black as coal and coarse as a mule where it mattered!” Daly sneers, interrupting Hammond’s wishful reminiscing. 

“You’ve never seen her,” Hammond frowns. “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I knew a girl called Pol,” Hedges says thoughtfully, scraping at his plate.

“Who doesn’t know a girl called Pol,” Hammond spits, his dander up now and looking to get into it with anybody. 

“Fine lady, was she?” Heather asks, always the peacekeeper.

“Don’t know if I’d go so far,” Hedges laughs, “but my god, she could suck your soul out through your prick.” 

That gets everybody laughing, including Tozer. He shakes his head so that they know they’ve been too crude, but he knows men can set their minds to very little else after six months away; it’s better that they share such jokes amongst themselves now, than in front of the crew.

Of course Armitage is here - he generally is at mealtimes and in the evenings. The marines don’t seem to mind; he doesn’t impose himself, he barely makes his presence known. Today he’s sitting right next to Solomon, but that isn’t always the way, Sol has been very careful to make sure of it. Their friendship could cause problems, and not just for the two of them; even the most innocent kind of favouritism is dangerous where rank is involved. 

Tommy knows this as well as Sol does and seems content to have the company either way, even if he is currently ignoring the bawdy chatter - or perhaps it doesn’t filter through his dumb ear. Sol turns himself slightly to glance at Tommy’s face and sees the colour in his cheeks, scarlet as a doxy’s petticoats. So he must have heard some of it, unless there are dirty stories in the school reader he’s stuck his nose in. 

He oughtn’t to read at the supper table, thinks Tozer; it will win Tommy no favours to come over bookish, but Sol finds he hasn’t the heart to say so, even when they are alone. 

“What I wouldn’t give for a stroll up Lover’s Lane with dear Polly,” Hammond says, close enough to sighing over it. 

“I had an uncle what warned me to stay off street girls,” Wilkes puts in, chewing on a bit of fat from his beef, picking it out of his teeth and inspecting the contents gathered under his nails. “They’re dirty, they are. Want to get a girl with rooms of her own, he always said.”

“Navy got you on double pay, have they?” Hammond snorts. 

“As if you’d turn down a fourpenny knee-trembler if she came striding in.”

“Nah, wouldn’t want to choke ‘er,” Wilkes leans back on his bench and grabs his parts under the table, leering and causing much merriment. 

Daly wipes his eyes, shoulders shaking, “more for me, I’d take my relief any way I could get it, way things are going.”

“We’re not half way, yet,” Heather reminds him.

“Christ.” 

“Don’t get him thinking on it,” Hedges says, lighting his pipe, “his hammock’ll be shaking and trembling all bloody night now.”

“That’s me dreaming of your wife,” Daly returns. 

“All right,” Solomon straightens, raising his voice, “enough of that.”

“Only a bit of sport, Sergeant.”

“I’m bored of it, talk about something else.”

Chastised, they grumble and eye each other until Heather starts on one of his fishing stories, which usually have a funny ending, so everyone shuts up to listen. Even Tommy finally closes his book, and inclines his head to hear better, leaning forward on his folded arms with a big grin as Heather gesticulates. 

Solomon finishes his plate and washes it down with a mouthful of Allsops. He had to put a stop to that talk - you can’t let them go on and on, otherwise boasting turns into grousing faster than you can keep up. Let them remember the pleasures of England, Sol thinks; a bit of homesickness never did any harm, but don’t let them suffer with it. 

The heat in Tommy’s face has calmed, his cheeks are pale as milk again. Sol wonders what it would take to get the flush to return, and on that thought finishes the last in his tankard. 

They’ve been seeing to each other pretty regularly, and Sol has grown very fond of his dear shipmate. They don’t go much further than a bit of rutting over clothes, and perhaps that is the cause of Tommy’s blushes. He’s a quiet fellow, but he’s not shamed by it, Solomon likes to think he’d be able to tell the difference. Still, as the summer approaches and the officers assure them that a thaw is on its way, they’re short of time and short of space; short of anything that would lend itself to proper roll-about, so for now it’s nothing more than what they can get away with. Sol thinks about it though, the better he gets to know Tommy Armitage. He thinks about it even when he shouldn’t. 

The bell rings and everyone at their mess hauls themselves to their feet. Solomon realises his knee was pressed against Tommy’s below the table, he can still feel the warm spot beneath his wool trousers where they were touching. 

He doesn’t dwell on it, and anyway Tommy disappears like smoke after meals, his duty being at the tub in the galley. Tozer has his men to organise, and the day ahead to think about. 

They don’t cross paths again until evening. Solomon has the first watch and they exchange their usual greeting as he walks by Tommy’s cabin. 

“All right, Tommy.”

“Evening, Sergeant Tozer.”

Through the curtain, just like that. They are friends enough now that Solomon often finds reasons to pass by earlier, allowing them a few moments spare to pass the time of day. Not that either of them are grand conversationalists. 

“Gunroom’s short of oil,” Tommy says, ducking his head as he peers through his curtain, pulling it part way, “brandy and Hollands too. None in the pantry, I checked.”

“That so?” Tozer replies evenly.

“Aye. I’ll ask Mr Jopson for permission to go below, but he’ll want me supervised.”

“Tomorrow, reckon?”

“Fore-noon watch, most like.”

“Right,” Tozer nods. “Evening, then.”

“Evening,” Tommy draws back the curtain, and Sol catches the beginnings of a smile. 

* * *

“Missed you at breakfast.”

“Had to have it cold, Mr Lane kept me over a loose button.”

“S’if Lane can’t sew his own buttons.”

“Not much use being a petty officer if you’ve got to do all your own stitching like any old AB, I s’pose.”

Solomon chuckles. Armitage remains ‘economical in his verbalising’, as Heather once put it, but he’s quick enough to make a point. They reach the final hatch and Solomon climbs down into the darkness first, then Tommy.

A marine and a steward might find all kinds of reasons to go below together and avoid suspicion, they are fortunate in that regard. Tommy is carrying the lantern, the brass fixtures creaking quietly as it swings in his hand, raised to shoulder height to illuminate the hold. It ought to be cold, considering they are below the water line, and surrounded by solid pack ice, but the stokers have been feeding the engines all night and it’s sweltering; the air so close and thick it summons up Africa in Solomon’s memory - black, black nights and the burning fever heat pressing in on all sides.

Light from the lantern pours out across the boards as Tommy arrives at the bottom of the ladder. It creates shadows and shapes in all the hollow spaces of the hold, Solomon can hear the quiet hiss of the wick burning down. 

“Had my tack with Mr Gibson,” Tommy goes on to say, “he was late to break his fast too; Lieutenant Hodgson kept him over something. Very particular, is Lieutenant Hodgson.”

“Rather you than me. Bet the talk was less coarse, though.”

Tommy chuckles, nodding, “I should say so.”

“With all they say about sailors I’ll be damned if marines aren’t worse when it comes to bragging.”

“Nah, you hear the same things all over,” Armitage says, leading the way to the cabin stores. He turns back as he reaches the door, mischief glinting in his eyes as the light strikes across his face, “well,” he says, “from what I do hear.” He gestures at his deaf ear, then sets down the lamp to look for Jopson’s key in his waistcoat pocket.

Solomon grins, watching him. He likes Tommy’s quiet humour, such a pleasant change from the marines’ blunt and rowdy jests. He reaches out to place a hand on Tommy’s shoulder, and the steward turns to look at him just as the key finds the lock. His big pale eyes are so bright in the gathering gloom, and he quickly catches on, eager as Solomon is to get down to it.

They kiss fondly, as friends and then a little more, softening into each other's warmth. Tommy takes Sol’s face in his hands, his cool fingers press into the tender skin where his beard meets his neck. Feeling lusty and cavalier, Solomon gropes Tommy’s arse, squeezing, and runs his tongue across Tommy’s bottom lip. 

Tommy hums softly, then pulls back, whispering, “we could…” his mouth twists, his brow wrinkles, “...if you wanted, Sol...”

“What’s that?” Solomon asks, bleary from kissing and aching for contact. 

“You said once you wanted to do more than…” his face turns red again, from the roots of his black curls to the tips of his ears. He clears his throat, abashed, “all that talk yesterday. Thought maybe… do you want?”

Solomon takes a moment to discern Tommy’s meaning - he’s sure he has said many things while his blood is up and his cock is hard; he lets his mouth run away from him sometimes in the moments before he spends. He hopes he hasn’t said anything too indecent, after all Tommy is such a dear pal. Pulling each other off is one thing, and Solomon has no complaints at all, but the thought of fucking - now that Tommy seems to be suggesting it - changes the terms a bit. A renewed excitement begins to curl in his loins, a greedy itch. 

“Are you sure, Tommy?” he tries to catch his eye.

Tommy blinks, eyes cast down, sweat glittering on his forehead turned yellow as beads of honey in the thick golden light. 

“Yeah,” he says, “I reckon.” He swallows again, blinks again, then looks up “...will it hurt?” 

Sol’s stomach turns sour, “let’s not,” he says, losing his heart and his ardour all at once. This was a mistake - the hold, the contrivance of being here at all. These kinds of friendships are precarious even under the best circumstances. “Better not,” he says again, remembering himself, “harder to explain that one if you’re caught, eh?” 

He sees the relief flood Tommy’s wide eyes. 

“All right,” he says, voice low. “If you’re sure.”

Solomon leans in again to kiss Tommy’s jaw, a hand at his waist to encourage him close again. Tommy returns his enthusiasm, hands roaming under Sol’s jacket, seeking a way past his underthings to touch his skin. 

“God those hands,” Sol murmurs, “so soft.” 

“Can think of something softer,” Tommy says, and for a moment Solomon is caught off guard again trying to follow Tommy’s intention. Armitage looks up at him again, saucy as a maid, and then kneels.

“Fucking hell, Tommy, what’s got into you, eh?” Solomon strains against his drawers, blood thudding in his temples. Tommy shrugs coyly, his black curls gleaming in the puddle of pure gold cast by the lamp.

Quick with buttons as ever, Tommy soon has Solomon’s length in his palm, fingers stroking with such tender attention that Solomon fears his knees might buckle if the service continues like that. Tommy licks his lips, then glances up.

“Will you tell me how?”

“Eh? It’s easy,” Solomon says, looking down at him, impatient, “just do the same as the doxies do it.”

Armitage swallows. “I wouldn’t know, Sol.”

His eyes are wide and bewildered, and as quickly as Tozer was ready for it, he now feels himself begin to wilt, wanting to put himself away. “What?” He shifts uncomfortably on the balls of his feet, “never paid for it?”

“No.”

“Any girl then.”

“...nor that.” Tommy is cringing with embarrassment and Solomon can’t stand it. He reaches down and pulls him up again, so that they can stand eye to eye at least.

“Haven’t you  _ ever _ ?” He asks again, hands on Tommy’s shoulders. He never met a virgin sailor before, at least not one who’d confess to it.

“No.”

“Not with anyone?”

“...no.”

“Christ.” Solomon curses, feeling an oaf. “Wish you’d said so,” he says.

Tommy shrugs, looking as though he’s been clipped around the ear, staring at the lamp on the floor and setting his jaw. 

Solomon hastens to correct his blunder, “nowt wrong with it, I just--”

“--Who is down here?” The full-throated voice of an officer bellows into the hold, and Solomon hears footsteps on the rungs of the ladder behind them. 

“Don’t they pick their bloody moments,” Solomon mutters under his breath as Tommy - quicker witted than anyone will ever credit him for, and rarely given to panic - turns to twist the key in the pantry lock and yank it open. Tozer straightens his uniform and buttons his trousers as he steps neatly back to an innocent distance. By the time Irving reaches them both there is nothing to see at all. 

“Who’s there?” he says again, raising a lantern of his own.

“Sergeant Tozer, Lieutenant,” Solomon says, trying not to squint against the dazzling brightness. “Escorting Mr Armitage here to the stores. Got to keep an eye on the tars, haven’t we? Don’t want anything growing legs.”

“Indeed,” Irving is bemused. He’s not at ease with men; soldiers or sailors, there’s something askew in him Solomon can’t put his finger on. “Quick about it, please, Mr Armitage,” the lieutenant says, and Tommy turns back into the store nodding.

Fortunately Irving sees nothing amiss, and doesn’t think it worth his while to stay and watch. “I shall be checking with Mr Jopson.”

“Aye, Lieutenant,” Tozer salutes, and watches Irving leave, stooping beneath the beams and striding for the hatchway with a confidence Solomon does not find quite convincing. The navy attracts the oddest sorts from every rung of the ladder, that’s what he’s come to learn.

Once they are alone again Tommy’s white face reappears in the lantern’s steady beam. He acted cleverly, but he’s had a shock, that’s the first time they’ve come anywhere close to being caught. Ah well, Solomon thinks to himself, a man should know when to cut his losses.

“Just fetch what you need, Tommy,” Solomon says, his voice low again, “better not hang about here.” 

* * *

It has been almost a week since the misadventure in the hold, and Tommy still wants to bury his head every time he thinks about it. Sometimes the memory rears its head just as he is trying to sleep, and the humiliation jolts him so hard he kicks away his blankets and awakens startled and groaning. 

He oughtn’t to have let Sol in on it; he should have known it would put the sergeant off. Tommy cannot help being green, but he should have learnt by now not to wear it so boldly. 

It’s evening, supper has been eaten and the gunroom tidied. Tommy sits quietly in his cabin, trying to occupy himself with the school reader Mr Blanky gave him at Christmas. He could go and sit in the fo’c’sle, but Sol is on first watch, and Tommy wouldn’t want to miss it if he passes by as usual. He has even drawn back his curtain part way, in case he doesn’t hear him coming.

Someone is singing somewhere in the ship - he can hear it when his good ear is turned towards the left wall, “ _ thou shalt have a fishy, in a little dishy, thou shall have a fishy when the boat comes in… _ ”

It makes him homesick, his mam used to sing it. She was a fishwife, like every other woman in the village. Every day she would go to work by the harbour waiting for the boats to return and unload barrel after barrel of slippery silver herring. As a boy he’d collect the buckets of fish guts as fast as she could fill them, her little thin knife going in and out, quick as a sewing needle as she sang along with the other women. 

If he presses the heel of his hand against his deaf ear, he can hear a roaring, rushing sound just like the tide, the same as listening to a shell. It’s strange out here, where the sea makes no sound at all; it is still and solid and barren. You’d be forgiven for thinking the whole world has stopped moving. 

“ _ Dance t’ thy daddy, sing t’ thy mammy, Dance to thy daddy, t’ th mammy sing; _ ”

Stands to reason he’s sore for home, Tommy thinks, as long as they’ve been away now. Wouldn’t he love a plate of juicy Craster kipper for dinner, instead of Diggle’s canned muck. Sighing, Armitage scratches his head and turns the page of his book.

Heavy footsteps approach and stop just outside his cabin, he turns his head full of boyish hope.

“All right, lad?” Mr Blanky stands there smiling, eyeing Armitage’s reader. 

“Good evening, Mr Blanky, can I get you anything?” he makes to stand.

Blanks flaps his gloved hand at him, telling him to sit back down, “what was ‘A’, Mr Armitage?” 

Tommy frowns, confused, “sir?”

“Go on, been attending to your studies, haven’t you?” he nods at the book. 

Tommy can read - or at least he had enough letters to get by, before the expedition, but Mr Blanky has been very keen that Armitage apply himself to something while they are aboard and iced in; he won’t leave him alone with it. 

“Yes, Mr Blanky,” he nods emphatically, as if exaggerating the gesture will match Blanky’s booming voice. 

“Well then, what was ‘A’?”

“A was the archer, sir,” Tommy replies, “who shot a frog.” He hopes Mr Blanky isn’t of the mind to have him recite the entire alphabet.  _ B was a butcher who had a great dog... _

“And ‘p’?” Blanky encourages.

“Parson. Wore a black gown.”

Tommy watches as Blanky moves aside to let Sergeant Tozer pass him in the passageway, a flash of red and then he’s gone, and that’s it. 

“Fine memory!” The Ice Master grins, “why don’t you have a go with this next, eh?” He hands him a slim book. Another one. Armitage will practically be a clerk by the time the voyage is finished. “Lessons in English,” Blanky says, before Tommy can try to read the cover. “Tell me how you get on.”

“Yes, Mr Blanky, thank you, sir.”

“Good night, Mr Armitage.” 

He leaves, thudding merrily away, whistling along with the same tune that wafts through Terror.  _ Our Tommy’s always fuddling, he’s s’fond of ale, but he’s kind to me, I hope he’ll never fail. Thou shall have a fishy…  _

Armitage closes his reader and looks down at the new one. Flicking open the cover he idly skims the pages. It’s a book meant for children, and none of it makes any sense at all, and the queer pictures on each page do not help matters. He reads, frowning and mouthing out the words.  _ Do not nod on a sod _ .  _ Let Sam sip the sap of the red jam.  _

“Fuck’s sake,” he mutters, shaking his head and closing the book.

He goes about his evening slowly, making a fuss over folding his clothes and checking for scuffs on his shoes. He doesn’t read again, but he lies in bed pressing his bad ear into his pillow and listening to the ghostly sea in his imagination. He drifts in and out of sleep, waking once when someone in the fo’c’sle laughs, and again when everything has fallen silent. 

The second time he wonders if it was the bell that woke him - there’s a sense of shifting change throughout the ship that signals the end of a watch. The middle watch will be going up, and Sergeant Tozer coming down again, looking forward to climbing into his hammock, no doubt. Tommy rubs at his eyes and turns over his pillow for the cool side, restless. 

Why did he have to let on like that? He could have pretended, as he’s sure most of the men do; he could have said he’s had every girl in Northumberland. He’s never been much good at telling tall tales, and perhaps that’s why he’s still so green after years at sea. Bloody Hammond, he curses, bloody  _ Wilkes _ and his ‘fourpenny knee-trembler’. It was their doing, all that rough talk.

Sergeant Tozer had been decent about the whole thing of course, but Tommy can’t help wishing. He still can’t account for whatever mood came over him when he made the suggestion - except that he has never felt such a reckless urge with anyone but Solomon, and that he knows he would have gone through with it, had Irving not interrupted. He has been trying not to picture it, but he does now, in the lonely dark, and instantly regrets it as his prick begins to rise with curiosity at the very thought of kneeling before Solomon and --

“Tommy?” A shadow of a whisper which he barely catches, except that it comes from directly outside his cabin. He doesn’t answer, but sits up in his berth.

Sergeant Tozer pulls the curtain pack just enough to peer inside, and they both stare at each other through the dark. 

“Evening, Mr Armitage.”

“Evening, Sergeant.”

“Sleeping?”

“Not quite.”

Tozer clearly takes this as permission, and enters quickly, tugging the curtain silently closed behind him. Tommy clambers out of his berth, then remembers the predicament in his lower regions and ends up sitting with his legs over the edge of the bunk, hastily gathering the blankets across his lap.

Solomon seems not to notice, towering over him in the small space, close enough that his thighs almost bump against Armitage’s knees. He smells faintly of tobacco, and of sharp, clean snow. “I was thinking about what you told me, Tommy,” he says haltingly.

“Oh aye?”

“Aye,” Solomon nods, looking down. “I reckon I’ve been going about things arse-backwards.”

Solomon meets his eye, and leans in even closer, so that Tommy can feel his breath in his hair. He places a warm, heavy hand on Tommy’s knee, just above it. Tommy feels his heart pick up, his prick throbs keenly, fully awake now. 

“Yeah?” is all he can think to say. He isn’t quite sure what Sol means and he’s too much on edge to ask. 

“Yeah,” Sol smiles, ducking his head to kiss Tommy, with just as much friendly feeling as he always does. Armitage shifts himself forward on the bed, tilting his head back a little as they are united in affection. Perhaps Sol wants to try things over, Tommy thinks with mounting excitement. He’s sure he could do it with a bit of direction - he  _ wants _ to, very much. He reaches for Sol’s trousers, to make this point clear. 

Solomon pulls back, raised eyebrows and beaming face, then quickly sinks to his knees before him, pulling back the blankets and fumbling with the buttons on Tommy’s long johns with stiff frozen fingers. The light from the lamps in the passage outside seeps through the thin curtain and washes under the gap at the bottom. It highlights the glittering gold on Solomon’s uniform, and the wanton look in his dark eyes.

“Sol!” Tommy hisses, feeling heat rush into his cheeks and up the back of his neck.

“Sh!” Tozer says, before gripping Tommy’s prick and lowering his mouth around it.

He’s wondered about this act many times, wondered how it might feel - but he never thought about how it would  _ look _ , having Solomon Tozer’s golden head in his lap, Tommy’s blazing red cock disappearing between his lips. His gut tightens, he shudders, leaning back helplessly, gripping his blankets and panting hard.

Tommy may be inexperienced; he may not have had any other lovers - paid or otherwise - but he is absolutely certain that the service he is receiving is being ably demonstrated. As good as Solomon’s warm rough hands are, and as satisfying as their encounters have regularly been, the warm wetness of his tongue and mouth are another thing altogether, such a peculiar kind of pleasure that sets his limbs trembling. 

His crisis arrives slowly, bobbing towards him like a wave at low tide. He feels the eager promise of it burning in his belly, the sensation of Solomon's mouth sliding over his prick so maddening he could yell. When it comes it rolls upwards, into his chest and tightening every muscle. He arches up, his mouth drops open and he gasps as silently as he can, eyes squeezed shut. 

Sol removes his hand and wipes it on the bed sheet, then gives one last lick which Tommy feels in the base of his spine, turning him almost hysterical as his cock twitches and his insides squirm. Sitting back on his knees Sergeant Tozer grins up at him, his beard wet and his mouth red. 

“Well?” Sol raises his eyebrows.

“What?” Armitage blinks, worried he has made some error. 

“Well? First time, wasn’t it? Did I measure up?”

Tommy feels his face burning again, he hopes it’s too dark for Sol to see. He nods, unable to say it aloud.

“Good,” Solomon lightly slaps Tommy’s knee, then stands up again. “I’d better get going.”

“But you…” Tommy wants to reach for him. 

“Plenty for tonight,” Solomon kisses his cheek, then the top of his head. “Time for all that another day.”

He squeezes Tommy’s hand, gives him one last smile and then leaves as quietly as he entered. The curtain falls back into place and Tommy flops back down into his berth, his muscles singing with sweet satisfaction and his heart thudding out a fond rhythm beneath his ribs. He lays his dumb ear against the pillow and closes his eyes and drifts off with the endless tide. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
